Editor's note: This report compiles all relevant news, events and
materials on International and European Sports Law based on the daily coverage
provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser. You
are invited to complete this survey via the comments section below, feel free
to add links to important cases, documents and articles we might have
overlooked.

The Headlines

#Save(d)Hakeem

The plight of
Hakeem al-Araibi – the 25-year-old refugee footballer who was arrested last
November in Bangkok upon his arrival from Australia on the basis of a red
notice issued by Interpol in contravention of its own policies which afford
protection to refugees and asylum-seekers – continued throughout the month of
January. Bahrain – the country Hakeem al-Araibi fled in 2014 due to a
(well-founded) fear of persecution stemming from his previous experience when
he was imprisoned and tortured as part of the crackdown on pro-democracy
athletes who had protested against the royal family during the Arab spring –
maintained a firm stance, demanding that Hakeem be extradited to serve a prison
sentence over a conviction for vandalism charges, which was allegedly based on
coerced confessions and ignored evidence.

While international
sports governing bodies were critised from the very beginning for not using
enough leverage with the governments of Bahrain and Thailand to ensure that
Hakeem’s human rights are protected, they have gradually added their voice to
the intense campaign for Hakeem’s release led by civil society groups. FIFA,
for example, has sent a letter directly to the Prime Minister of Thailand, urging
the Thai authorities ‘to take the
necessary steps to ensure that Mr al-Araibi is allowed to return safely to
Australia at the earliest possible moment, in accordance with the relevant
international standards’. Yet many activists have found this action
insufficient and called for sporting sanctions to be imposed on the national
football associations of Bahrain and Thailand.

Russia avoids further sanctions from WADA despite
missing the deadline for handing over doping data from the Moscow laboratory

WADA has been back
in turmoil ever since the new year began as the Russian authorities failed to
provide it with access to crucial doping data from the former Moscow laboratory
within the required deadline
which expired on 31 December 2018, insisting that the equipment WADA intended to use
for the data extraction was not certified under Russian law. The Russian
Anti-Doping Agency thus failed to meet one of the two conditions under which
its three-year suspension was controversially
lifted in September 2018.
The missed deadline sparked outrage among many athletes and national
anti-doping organisations, who blamed WADA for not applying enough muscle
against the Russian authorities.

Following the
expiry of the respective deadline, it appeared that further sanctions could be
imposed on the Russian Anti-Doping Agency, but such an option was on the table
only until WADA finally managed to access the Moscow laboratory and retrieve the
doping data on 17
January 2019. Shortly thereafter, WADA President Sir Craig Reedie hailed the
progress as a major breakthrough for clean sport and members of the WADA
Executive Committee agreed that no further
sanctions were needed
despite the missed deadline. However, doubts remain as to whether the data have
not been manipulated. Before WADA delivers on its promise and builds strong
cases against the athletes who doped – to be handled by international sports
federations – it first needs to do its homework and verify whether the
retrieved data are indeed genuine.

British track cyclist Jessica Varnish not an employee
according to UK employment tribunal

On 16 January 2019,
an employment tribunal in Manchester rendered a judgment with wider implications for athletes and sports
governing bodies in the United Kingdom, ruling that the female track cyclist
Jessica Varnish was neither an employee nor a worker of the national governing
body British Cycling and the funding agency UK Sport. The 28-year-old multiple
medal winner from the world and European championships takes part in
professional sport as an independent contractor but sought to establish before
the tribunal that she was in fact an employee of the two organisations. This
would enable her to sue either organisation for unfair dismissal as she was
dropped from the British cycling squad for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de
Janeiro and her funding agreement was not renewed, allegedly in response to her
critical remarks about some of the previous coaching decisions.

The tribunal
eventually dismissed her challenge, concluding that ‘she was not personally performing work provided by the respondent –
rather she was personally performing a commitment to train in accordance with
the individual rider agreement in the hope of achieving success at
international competitions’. Despite the outcome of the dispute, Jessica
Varnish has insisted that her legal challenge contributed to a positive change
in the structure, policies and personnel of British Cycling and UK Sport, while
both organisations have communicated they had already taken action to
strengthen the duty of care and welfare provided to athletes.

Editor's Note: Frans M. de Weger is legal counsel for the Federation of Dutch Professional Football Clubs (FBO) and CAS arbitrator. De Weger is author of the book “The Jurisprudence of the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber”, 2nd edition, published by T.M.C. Asser Press in 2016. Frank John Vrolijk specialises in Sports, Labour and Company Law and is a former legal trainee of FBO and DRC Database.

This second blog will focus
specifically on the sanctions available for FIFA under Article 12bis. It will provide
explanatory guidelines covering the sanctions imposed during the period
surveyed.

Introduction

The possibility to impose
sanctions under article 12bis constitutes one of the pillars of the 12bis
procedure. Pursuant to Article 12bis of the RSTP, edition 2016, the DRC and the
PSC may impose a sanction on a club if the club is found to have delayed a due
payment for more than 30 days without a prima
facie contractual basis[1] and the creditor have put
the debtor club in default in writing, granting a deadline of at least 10 days.[2] The jurisprudence in
relation to Article 12bis also shows that sanctions are imposed ex officio by the DRC or the PSC and not
per request of the claimant.More...

Editor’s Note: Saverio Spera is an Italian lawyer and LL.M.
graduate in International Business Law at King’s College London. He is
currently an intern at the ASSER International Sports Law Centre.

This blog is a follow up to my previous contribution on the validity of Unilateral Extension Options
(hereafter UEOs) under national and European law. It focuses on the different
approaches taken to UEOs by the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC) and the
Court of arbitration for sport (CAS). While in general the DRC has adopted a
strict approach towards their validity, the CAS has followed a more liberal
trend. Nonetheless, the two judicial bodies share a common conclusion: UEOs are
not necessarily invalid. In this second blog I will provide an overview of the similarities
and differences of the two judicial bodies in tackling UEOs. More...

Editor’s Note: Saverio Spera
is an Italian lawyer and LL.M. graduate in International Business Law at King’s
College London. He is currently an intern at the ASSER International Sports Law
Centre.

In the
football world the use of unilateral extension options (hereafter UEOs) in
favour of the clubs is common practice. Clubs in Europe and, especially, South
America make extensive use of this type of contractual clauses, since it gives
them the exclusive possibility to prolong the employment relationship with
players whose contracts are about to come to an end. This option gives to a
club the right to extend the duration of a player’s contract for a certain
agreed period after its initial expiry, provided that some previously
negotiated conditions are met. In particular, these clauses allow clubs to sign
young promising players for short-term contracts, in order to ascertain their
potential, and then extend the length of their contracts.[1]
Here lies the great value of UEOs for clubs: they can let the player go if he
is not performing as expected, or unilaterally retain him if he is deemed
valuable. Although an indisputably beneficial contractual tool for any football
club, these clauses are especially useful to clubs specialized in the
development of young players.[2] After
the Bosman
case, clubs have increasingly used these clauses in order to prevent players
from leaving their clubs for free at the end of their contracts.[3] The
FIFA Regulations do not contain any provisions regulating this practice,
consequently the duty of clarifying the scope and validity of the options lied
with the national courts, the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC) and the
CAS. This two-part blog will attempt to provide the first general overview on
the issue.[4] My
first blog will be dedicated to the validity of UEOs clauses in light of
national laws and of the jurisprudence of numerous European jurisdictions. In a
second blog, I will review the jurisprudence of the DRC and the CAS on this
matter. More...

Editor's note: Adriaan Wijckmans is an associate specialized in sports law at the Belgium law firm Altius.

In a recent judgment, the Brussels Court of
First Instance confirmed the legality of a so-called surety undertaking, i.e. an
agreement in which the parents of a minor playing football guarantee that their
child will sign a professional contract with a football club as soon as the child
reaches the legal age of majority.

This long-awaited ruling was hailed, on the one hand, by clubs as a
much needed and eagerly anticipated confirmation of a long-standing practice in
Belgian football[1] and, on
the other hand, criticised by FIFPro, the international
player’s trade union, in a scathing press release. More...

Editor’s note:
Tomáš Grell comes from Slovakia and is currently an LL.M. student
in Public International Law at Leiden University. He contributes also to
the work of the ASSER International Sports Law Centre as a part-time
intern.

This is a follow-up
contribution to my previous blog on FIFA's responsibility for human rights abuses
in Qatar published last week. Whereas the previous part has examined the lawsuit
filed with the Commercial Court of the Canton of Zurich ('Court') jointly by the Dutch trade union FNV, the
Bangladeshi Free Trade Union Congress, the Bangladesh Building and Wood Workers
Federation and the Bangladeshi citizen Nadim Shariful Alam ('Plaintiffs')
against FIFA, this second part will focus on the Court's ruling dated 3 January
2017 ('Ruling').[1]More...

Editor’s note: Tomáš Grell comes from Slovakia and is currently an LL.M. student in Public International Law at Leiden University. He contributes also to the work of the ASSER International Sports Law Centre as a part-time intern.

More than six years later, on 3 January 2017, the Commercial Court of the Canton of Zurich ('Court') dismissed the lawsuit filed against FIFA[1] jointly by the Dutch trade union FNV, the Bangladeshi Free Trade Union Congress, the Bangladesh Building and Wood Workers Federation and the Bangladeshi citizen Nadim Shariful Alam ('Plaintiffs').[2] The Plaintiffs requested the Court to find FIFA responsible for alleged human rights violations of migrant workers in connection with the World Cup in Qatar. Had the Plaintiffs' claims been upheld by the Court, such decision would have had far-reaching consequences on the fate of thousands of migrants, mostly from India, Nepal and Bangladesh, who are currently working on the construction of sporting facilities and other infrastructure associated with organization of the World Cup. More...

Editor’s
Note: Emre Bilginoglu[1]
is an attorney in Istanbul and the co-founder of the Turkish E-Sports Players
Association, a non-profit based in Istanbul that aims to provide assistance to
professional gamers and to work on the relevant laws affecting them.

The world is witnessing the
rise of a new sport that is growing at an incredible speed: E-Sports. We are
only starting to understand its legal implications and challenges.

In
recent years, E-Sports has managed to attract thousands of fans to arenas to
see a group of people play a video game. These people are literally
professional gamers (cyber athletes)[2]
who make money by competing in tournaments. Not all video games have tournaments
in which professional players compete against each other.

The most played
games in E-Sports competitions are League of Legends (LoL),
Defense of the Ancients 2 (DotA 2) and Counter-Strike: Global
Offensive (CS:GO). LoL and DotA are both Multiplayer online
battle arena (MOBA) games, a genre of strategy video games in which the player
controls a single character in one of two teams. The goal of the game is to
destroy the opponent’s main structure. CS:GO is a first-person shooter (FPS)
game, a genre of video games where the player engages combat through a
first-person perspective. The main objective in CS:GO is to eliminate the opposing team
or to terrorize or counter-terrorize, planting bombs or rescuing hostages. Other
games that have (popular) E-Sports competitions include Starcraft II (real time
strategy), Hearthstone (collectible card video game), Call of Duty (FPS) and
FIFA (football).

The
gaming requires cooperation between team players, a high level of concentration,
rapid reactions and some seriously fast clicking. E-Sports is a groovy term to
describe organized competitive computer gaming. The E-Sports industry is
exponentially growing, amounting to values expressed in billions of dollars. According
to Newzoo,
a website dedicated to the collection of E-Sports data, there are some 250
million occasional viewers of E-Sports with Asia-Pacific accounting for half of
the total amount. The growth of the industry is indubitably supported by online
streaming media platforms. This article aims to explain what E-Sports is and to give the readers
an insight on the key legal questions raised by it. More...

Editor's note: Marine Montejo is a graduate from the College of
Europe in Bruges and is currently an intern at the ASSER International Sports
Law Centre.

The result of the Brexit referendum on 23
June 2016 took the European Union (almost) by surprise. A lot has been said and
written about the impact of the United Kingdom leaving the EU. As in all other
areas, the British sport sector will also face the effects of the modification
of the relationship between the EU and its (probable) former Member State, the
UK. It is nearly impossible to foresee all consequences as the UK has not even
triggered article 50 TFEU yet to officially start the exit negotiations.
However, as the UK position toward the EU will change in any case, this two-part
blog aims to examine the main practical implications of such an exit for the
UK, but also for the EU, in relation to the actual application of EU law in
sport and the EU sport policy.

Unless stated otherwise, the use of the
terms Brexit in this blog should be understood as a complete exit of the UK
from the European Union. This blog focus in particular on this worst case
scenario and its consequences for UK sport. However, it is highly improbable
that the future Brexit negotiations with the EU will end up without some kind
of special agreement between the two parties the first of which being an EEA
type of agreement with full access to the internal market and applicability of
EU law.

The first part of this blog will examined
the consequences for UK sport in terms of access to the EU internal market and
the applicability of free movement principles. The second part is focused on specific
impacts with regard of others domain of EU law for professional and grassroots
UK sport. More...

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This blog is a knowledge hub for all things related with International Sports Law. On this page, you will find the recent developments in the field: publications, events and cases. Moreover, we will provide outstanding (short) academic commentaries on the most pressing questions in International Sports Law.